Various techniques have been employed over the years to discourage use of conventional office equipment (e.g., color photocopiers) for counterfeiting of banknotes and similar financial instruments. One technique is to equip photocopiers with the capability to recognize banknotes documents and, upon such recognition, disable or impair copying.
While such approaches offer some deterrence against counterfeiting, they suffer from various drawbacks and limitations. The present invention seeks, through its various embodiments, to redress certain of these drawbacks and to provide additional functionality not previously available.
The foregoing and additional features and advantages of the present invention will be more readily apparent from the following detailed description, which proceeds with reference to the accompanying drawings.